


Rant

by RacheIDuncan



Series: Survivor [3]
Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-04
Updated: 2015-03-04
Packaged: 2018-03-16 08:46:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3481850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RacheIDuncan/pseuds/RacheIDuncan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Days later and Peggy's trying to break her one-armed push up record but gets interrupted by a face from her past.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rant

"...One hundred and three..."

Sunday afternoons are Peggy's favourite time of week. It's a time reserved for simple stressless pleasures, a time to let go of all those thoughts and obligations running around her head. 

Of course it's not easy to just forget them, but with Angie around it had become less difficult to just take a moment. 

"...One hundred and four..."

But Angie has an audition and that's left Peggy with little to nothing left to do. She'd already exhausted another few books, cleaned her weapons. She'd even called Jarvis and had him give her a detailed step by step guideline on how to make an exquisite rhubarb pie. She must remember to check on that soon actually. 

"...One hundred and five..."

The last few days had been intense, there was simply no denying that. But after everything, all these revelations, these confirmations of things she already suspected, there's a calmness about her. A peace that had been foreign to her for so long. 

She must have been an infant - yes, a picnic with her parents by the lake, she'd been running around in the long grass, chasing after butterflies, then she collapsed into the blanket by her mother's lap where her baby brother was bouncing. Her father had fed her mother a slice of an apple and kissed her. It was one of the memories that got her through it all. 

"...One hundred and six..."

That and Angie's smile, the smell of her perfume. The feel of her skin beneath her fingertips.

Her distant past - her parents and her brother - it was a pleasant history, before school, before that night, before the war, but now? With Angie? She'd go through everything again if it meant she'd be with her forever. 

"...One hundred and seven..."

Forever. Could she do that? Regardless of the social implications, the secrecy, could she promise Angie eternity in the life she leads? Guns blazing, lives ending, could she do it? Peggy Carter, everyone she loves either ends up hating her or dies. She’s had to sit there and be cast away or sit there while he plummets into ice water. It’s how it’s always been, since she was a child, it can’t change, can it? 

But Angie, with Angie there’s something feral within her that starts to grunt and growl at the prospect of her coming into harm. With Angie there’s a promise in her blood, in her very essence, to keep her safe. Regardless of the cost. Regardless of everything.

Keep Angie safe and keep Angie happy. It’s a mantra that Peggy goes through every moment in the day. And if Peggy herself is what makes Angie happy, then she can’t just leave her. She can’t pack up and leave even if it would mean that Angie wasn’t so close to the fire that is Peggy’s life because then she’d be sad. Then she’d cry. 

Peggy stands by the belief that Angie crying is the worst thing in the world ever.

Okay, maybe that’s a little drastic.

“...One hundred and---”

Ring. 

Peggy, startled, hits the ground hard.

"Bastard hell."

She was just about to break her record of how many one armed push ups she can do. She supposes that one hundred and seven and a half is still something to boast about. That extra half does increase her intimidation slightly. Pulling herself up from the floor, straightening out her shirt -- one of those white SSR shirts that Steve used to have so many of -- Peggy smirks to herself. 

The doorbell rings again.

Angie has this habit, you see, of forgetting her key. So many times since they moved in together has Peggy been curled up on the sofa, cup of tea in her hands, and lazily thumbing through some novel (a sometimes welcome break from the science of genetics) when the doorbell would ring. Angie, with a sheepish grin on her face, would be on the other side stumbling out apologies. She always insists on making Peggy dinner after that. 

Wiping down the back of her neck with a towel as she descends the stairs, Peggy can’t help the smile on her face. She loves Angie’s cooking. It reminds her of home but it’s not that tiresome British cuisine. Honestly if she ever has to eat another roasted potato---

But the silhouette through the glass isn’t Angie. 

It’s a broad shouldered man, that’s what Peggy can guess. His outline leaves too much to the imagination, so much so that, clad in nothing but her underthings and this t-shirt, Peggy feels weak suddenly. Exposed.

She grabs a pistol that she’d had taped to the bottom of a table -- the one where the main phone sits -- and holds it against the door as she opens it. This man, this stranger, he has his back to her, looking out to the street. With her lower half and her gun hidden behind the door, Peggy clears her throat, says:

“Excuse me?”

And he turns around.

Peggy drops her gun.

"Well aren't you a sight for sore eyes, Marge."

/ / 

“Peggy! I’m home!”

Angie’s feet hurt. They hurt so goddamn much. Sometimes she wonders why she even bothers. Another afternoon of disappointment, being a failure. The past few weeks, all these auditions, all these failures. She spent all afternoon singing and dancing for that bulging eyed, thick necked jerk and he tossed her to the side. Sent her kicking the pavement as she walked home.

She did this a lot, walk back to the place. It’s far from the theatre district, Peggy wasn’t lying, really quite far, but the subway trips are just too quick for her to well and truly wallow in her defeat. Always in her head, they used to say, that Angie Martinelli, she spends too much time in her head. But it’s how she copes, how she puts on that character of herself. Angie wouldn’t have made it out of Poland if she didn’t take some time in her head. In her head, she could think things through, consider them. Make things make sense. She could spend hours going over her lines, over and over again. 

Which is why when directors give her lines to say on the day, she never gets the part. It takes her a while to figure out how to make the words make sense. See, for Angie, the words like to move about the paper, they like to distort and they like to pulsate. They don’t stay still enough for her to read them. ‘s why her writing’s so messy and the chef and the diner used to give her hell for it. ‘s why she likes it when Peggy reads to her.

It’s not that she doesn’t want to read for herself. It’s just hard. 

She’s just stupid or something.

Peggy doesn’t ask questions though, like when Angie asks her to read the recipe out loud so she can bake a new type of pie. (Why is British food so savoury?) Or when Angie asks her to write out a letter she can send to her brothers because they always write back that they can’t understand her writing. Peggy’s great like that. 

She’s the best thing that’s ever happened to her.

Peggy doesn’t stop the nightmares, no, and she doesn’t get rid of the scars on her skin, but Peggy has her own nightmares, her own scars. She understands and she’s there to hold her on her bad nights. (Like Angie’s there to hold Peggy on her bad nights). It’s not right to the world but damn it’s right to them.

Angie wants to marry her some day. 

Even if she’s old and grey, can barely walk let alone dance, she wants to stand in front of everyone who ever called them wrong and say that she loves Peggy. Slide a ring onto her finger. 

Would they have tulips or lilies at the wedding?

Tulips. Lilies are far too morbid.

It’s where she always ends up, thinking about her life with Peggy, her long life with Peggy. It’s what makes sense after tiresome, wasted auditions. Gives her life a sense of purpose when she has those moments of feeling like a nothing.

After having it beaten into you, it takes a lot of kisses to remember that you are worth something. 

Which is why, when Angie shuts the door behind her -- she remembered her key this time -- and what she doesn’t hear is Peggy saying her usual ‘Hello, darling’ from her spot in the drawing room, Angie frowns.

And then there’s the yelling.

“It’s been seven years! For heavens sake, Matthew!”

“Don’t you act like you didn’t deserve it, Marge, you’re not allowed to act innocent in all of this!” 

It’s in the kitchen and there’s a gun out on the telephone table.

Pulling her handbag closer, Angie slowly steps towards the kitchen, careful to make sure her flats don’t make a sound on the hardwood floor. What she smells is rhubarb pie.

“I was nineteen! I wasn't half as bad as you and yet--....Angie.”

Angie, wide eyed, looks around at the scene. There’s a strange man in her kitchen, he’s in a suit and has this perfectly groomed beard, more perfect than any Angie had seen on a man before. His hair, chestnut, sweeps to the side. His jaw is strong. Shaking his head, he turns to look at her and Angie gasps.

His eyes are so familiar.

“Angie…”

She snaps her head to Peggy, the other side of the breakfast counter with bare legs and that SSR shirt. If she wasn’t in such a state of shock, she’d be taking a good few minutes to admire the view. 

But this man’s eyes, they---

“Well, aren’t you darling.”

“Don’t.”

It’s a strong hiss from Peggy, territorial. 

“What’s going on, English?” Angie asks, stepping further into the room. She doesn’t take her eyes of this man. He looks at her and what she feels like is a slab of meat. Swallowing hard, Angie inches closer to Peggy, “Why’s there a strange guy in our house?”

Peggy inhales sharply.

This man, his lips pull up into this sort of smug smirk, like the Cheshire Cat, and he chuckles, “Shacking up with another woman? My, my Margaret, what would mother say?”

Peggy’s jaw twitches, she growls, “She was dead before you even spoke your first word, you don’t get to discuss what mother would have thought of me. Grandmother did it enough.”

The man laughs, says, “You know it’s true. She’d have kicked you out just like Grandmother did.” He picks up an apple, twirls it about his hands in a way that makes Angie recluse further into Peggy. He has this look in his eyes that reminds her of nightmares, he reminds her of the devils. He continues, “But you live in your ignorance, Marge, you pretend that she would have still loved you. Lord knows that’s the only way anyone ever will.” Taps the side of his head. “In there.” Even with space between them, Angie can feel Peggy shaking. She can feel her jaw clench and unclench. She doesn’t have to look at her hands to know that they’re curled into balls, nails digging into her palms. 

“You gotta leave,” Angie says. Her voice isn’t as strong as she would like it to be, but he’s just staring at her. He bites into this apple. “You hear me, you gotta leave before I make you.”

The man laughs, deep, guttural, and he says, “She’s hilarious, Marge, feisty though; where’d you find her? A pub in Brooklyn? Harlem? You used to love pubs, didn’t you, Marge?” He leans over the counter, a teasing grin. “You’d spend your nights looking for some tackle, didn’t you, Marge?”

“Get out,” Peggy spits.

This man just takes another bite, leans further forward, “You were the town whore, weren’t you, Marge? Punching men or sucking them. Women too.” He leers at Angie. Growls at Peggy, “You were a disgusting mess, pleasure to see you haven’t changed one bit.” Angie sees this guy sees men in uniforms dragging her into a tiny box and leaving her there for days. He grins, stands up. “Lovely seeing you again, sis. Uncle Samson sends his well wishes, you should really pop over the Atlantic some time and visit him, you always were his favourite.”

The way he breathes this word makes Angie's world fall apart. 

Angie, what Angie feels like is terrified and confused and stupid. There’s nothing that she can do, nothing she can say, other than watch as this man reaches into his pocket and take the business card he hands her. Peggy’s staring ahead, at some spot on the tile, her eyes are focused, intense. Angie can’t even find it in her to reach across at touch her. 

The man grins, “I’d love to stay and chat but I have places I need to be; I’ve left my card with your whore, we really do need to sit down and have a real catch up. I’ll let myself out, goodbye, Margaret.”

He drops the apple core at Angie’s feet, bring his face right by hers, “Know your place. Pick that up.”

She doesn’t.

“I said pick it up!” Screaming. Loud. Angie panics. Drops her purse. “God, Marge, don't---”

He doesn’t see the fist come flying at his face.

Angie turns and Peggy's panting, knuckles white. She spits, "It's Agent Carter now, you bastard."

The man, Angie has to steady herself on the counter while Peggy drags this unconscious man to the door and pushes him out mumbling something about how Jarvis can take him somewhere. 

The man is Peggy's brother. 

/ /

MATTHEW JAMES CARTER. 

CRIMINAL LAWYER. 

"Angie, are you alright?"

After placing the phone back down, Peggy turns to her, a glint, a worried glint in her eye. And Angie's just sat at the breakfast counter. 

The apple core is light between her fingers as she rolls it around them. When she blinks, she sees Peggy's eyes full with this burning hatred. Only they're not Peggy's eyes they're her brothers but they're the same. Peggy's eyes with an absence of the love she looks at her with.

Nightmares in real life are a thing that Angie is far too familiar with now. 

She thinks of the heap of man by the front door and worries her lower lip between her teeth. Peggy's brother. Older or younger, Angie can't figure but he has this sense of superiority about him, the type that Peggy would have if she hadn't been put down so much. Angie supposes that Peggy could be him if she was a boy. 

Angie snaps the core. She thinks of what he said.

Images, horrible images of Peggy but not her Peggy getting into fights, doing all sorts of things. It just doesn't add up. Peggy, her Peggy, the nice composed lady with a Secret Agent prowess, she wouldn't do those things. She wouldn't.

"Darling?"

A hand on the small of her back, Angie jumps, startled. And Peggy turns her around, hands on her shoulders and looks her right in the eye. Angie can't stand it, those eyes, there's love there but she knows what they look like with hatred. 

"What is it? Angie, love, talk to me."

Angie nips her lip, she's staring at her lap with she says, "Did you really do those things?"

Peggy exhales and looks at the ground, "Would you hate me if I did?”

“No,” Angie says desperately, picks up Peggy’s chin, “No, not on my life, I could never...It just…”

“What?”

Angie licks her lips, “It don’t sound like you, English.” She quirks her lips up in this confused little smile and slides her hands up to hold on Peggy’s forearms. “I get we all got pasts, bad pasts but…I don’t get it.” Dropping her hands to hug Peggy’s waist, Angie kisses her stomach against the shirt. 

Peggy runs her fingers through her hair, plays with some curls just like Angie likes, and says, “I was disenchanted with the prospects of tradition. Going from school to a husband seemed tedious, it wasn’t something I desired. Not to mean I don’t want that,” Peggy hastily tacks on in a way that makes Angie smile. “Commitment to someone I love, I just need to be doing something, I need a purpose. I can’t just be somebody’s wife. I knew that from a young age and...People were interested in me and I--...I yearned to break that tradition, I suppose.”

Angie pulls back, asks, in a quiet voice, looking Peggy dead in the eye, “How many?”

“Darling---”

“I gotta know, Peg, please.”

Peggy backs away at this, turns away. She scratches her fingers through her hair and shakes her head. Angie watches. And her perfect, prim and proper Peggy says, “Eleven.” A pause. “Before you, two women, nine men.”

“Oh.”

It must be something in her voice because Peggy turns around. She’s got this scared look on her face, the type that Angie thinks she must have been wearing when she came in. Angie’s reminded again of the dogs from the her childhood again. At first, when they didn’t know if they could trust her. When it took several pieces of bread to coerce them come to her. 

Angie asks, “Is that why he hates you? Because you did all that stuff and it wasn’t...ladylike.”

Peggy relaxes, chuckles dryly, “Partly. You must remember Angie, I did grow up in money but I was never obsessed with it. I suppose that’s why I was so...alright with living out of a single, very small suitcase for five years. I didn’t care for comfort, wealth, I still don’t. Matthew, on the other hand….”

“He’s a real rich boy, isn’t he?” Angie says, eliciting a smile from Peggy. “Could’a figured. I hate people like that, never had to struggle for nothin’.”

Peggy sits down on the stool next to her, cross her legs over, her bare legs that Angie finds herself staring at. She reaches across and places her fingers on her thigh, lets them trail up and down it. Peggy smiles softly and says, “When I turned eighteen, I was allowed access to my parent’s funds, my inheritance if you will. I’m not going to lie and say it wasn’t substantial, it was…” Her fingers find Angie’s, she plays with them. “More than you could ever think of.”

“Jeez, Peg, you’re makin’ it sound like you lived in Buckingham Palace,” Angie jokes lightly.

“Oh no, Westminster’s far too prissy.”

“Coming from you.”

“Have you not been listening to a word of any of this,” Peggy nudges her shoulder. “I would have been cast out of the city faster than an adult in Wonderland. Anyway, when I got this money, I didn’t do anything with it. I left it in the bank---”

“Nineteen thirty eight and you just let thousands waste away in a vault somewhere?” Angie asks incredulously.

Peggy considers for a moment, then meets Angie’s eyes, “Consider millions.”

Angie could collapse, faint. Fall to the ground. Peggy has money, like serious money. In nineteen thirty eight, Angie, all eighteen too, she had to go without food some nights just so her family could pay the bills. And Peggy just left millions of -- (what are they called again? Ounces? Something?) -- whatever sit and gather dust. 

“You’re pullin’ my leg,” She breathes out.

Peggy simply eyes her, “Yes so, I left it in the bank and Matthew...Matthew didn’t like that. He had been counting down until my birthday so he could….” She sighs. “The world made him a selfish man, so set on money and success that he didn’t take a moment to think. After our house had been sold, the money was the very last thing that our parents had left us. I didn’t have a photograph or a piece of jewellery, my grandmother got rid of it all -- selfish and gluttonous in her own right, she was. Matthew simply wanted what I wasn’t willing to give to him.” Peggy leans closer into Angie, leans her head against her shoulder. “He put money before everything, his friendships, his...Ruth.”

There’s something in the way Peggy’s tongue twists around that name, a fond familiarity. A longing. She stills and says, “Ruth. Who’s she?”

“Matthew’s girlfriend from all those years ago,” Peggy says. “She was wonderful, bright -- a year older than him, eighteen and just...amazing.” A beat. “She deserved so much better than him, she--...she was worth more than those millions.”

Angie turns her head a bit, nuzzles into Peggy’s hair, “She was one of the two, wasn’t she?”

Peggy squeezes her hand, “One night, Matthew was out gambling. Ruth had been waiting for hours and he wasn’t coming back. She thought it was her fault, she thought that she had done something wrong. But she hadn’t, she needed someone to love her, she needed… He came home while we were in bed. He told my grandmother, she sent me away only hours later.”

“Oh Peg--”

“Miss Carter?”

It’s Jarvis, his head is peeking around the door and Peggy pulls away. She can do nothing but smile fondly and watch Peggy dictate him. 

When Jarvis has Matthew hoisted over his shoulder, and is carrying him out to the car, Angie hears the sound of the door closing over, the sound of Peggy sliding down it.

Then there’s knocking and Peggy’s opening it again and then:

“Agent Carter?”

“Thompson---?”

“Make yourself decent, Carter, you’re coming with us.”


End file.
